A Field of Red Flowers
by ShimmerMist
Summary: A girl who has dreamt of Gensokyo for years suddenly finds herself there, but is there an easy way back?


A field of red flowers-

A lake covered in ice-

White petals falling from the sky-

I had taken even the smallest snippets of my dreams and written them down. Often vivid I felt inclined to write as many details as I could recall in the morning as soon as I had awakened which led to my shelves being lined with many notebooks. However, even with all those precautions there were things I had forgotten, but could not remember.

But I always remembered how I felt during those dreams, whether it was a feeling of overwhelming urgency, fear, surprise and even bemusement.

I looked up, seeing that my home was only a few blocks away. Though it was just an apartment it was also the place I had lived with my older brother for the last year and a half. When we had been younger our parents had died in a plane crash, though we were never told much more than that. Soon after we were told that it turned out we didn't have any living relatives and just like that we were sent off to separate foster homes.

Eight years later my brother turned eighteen and immediately bought an apartment, the one we live in now, and sent for me. Not that I didn't like the home I was in; It was nice but it never felt like home, since all the other kids were constantly coming and going and the parents never paid individual attention to us unless we were hurt or something. But it did surprise all of us when we got the call that I was going to be picked up and taken half way across the country to live with my brother who I hadn't talked to since we had been split up. However, we still didn't talk as often as most family members would. The only time I saw him was during the early hours of the day, if I happened to be awake then.

I put my thoughts on hold as I unlocked the door to the apartment opening and closing it in one swift movement as I went inside. A lot of people had commented on the way I moved before, saying it was unreal that anyone would move so quietly or smoothly. I thought of that fact, not for the first time today as I locked the door behind me. It looked like it might begin to rain later but I couldn't be sure. Most people might have used a television or a computer to confirm that, but not my brother and I. We just didn't have one, but if we really did need one we could go to our neighbor, Ms. Sweeper a middle aged woman's, apartment. She felt bad for us, parentless siblings living together with no relatives to rely on. I tried to not go over there so often though, because something about her was smothering, I had heard that though she had never been married she had several children who were all now grown up and moved out of her home.

I sighed and slipped upstairs silently even though I was the only one home, one of many habits I still hadn't lost from the years I spent at the foster home. I sighed and relaxed lying back on my bed contently. My room was the one place that I felt was really mine and that I could change at will something I do rather often. Currently my walls were a silver color, though I am already considering changing it, and the large windows that take up the side opposite from my door are covered by a heavy light blue curtain. When standing in my doorway the wall on the left is lined with shelves full of books and notebooks. On the right are a writing desk and a small lamp along with a small closet that I store my clothes in. The center of my room however is bare save for a thin, circular rug that is an odd maroon-brown color.

Bored, I walked to my closet and began looking for things to wear for tomorrow. I was odd in the fact that while many dressed down for, what is for most, the last day of the work week, I usually used that day to dress up. I shifted hangers to the side before picking out what I wanted, a sleeveless gray dress that went to about my mid thigh, black tights, and a pair of black fingerless gloves. I laid those items out on the end of my bed and went down to make myself something to eat. I stopped by the mirror in the hall to examine my hair momentarily. I frowned as I noted the significant lightening that had taken place recently. It had gone from my usual dark blond to the extremely pale, almost white, shade it was now. I sighed and decided to let it do whatever it wanted...it looked nice with my lighter blue-green eyes anyhow.

I made a quick meal of some leftover takeout that my brother must have had the night before, and returned upstairs to begin gathering the laundry. As I did so I thought about the odd dream I had had the night before….in some ways it was not so different from the others, but it was truly, closer to home. After all it had shown me one of the mysterious gaps I had noticed in a few of my other dreams but… it had been in a location familiar to me, right between the local Laundromat and an antique store I had been in once or twice.

I shoved my brother's clothes into the rolling laundry basket on top of my own, and pulled it carefully down the stairs. Then I ran back up and grabbed a notebook and a pen just in case and put them into a shoulder bag that contained my cell phone and a few other things. Remembering the chance of rain, I also grabbed an umbrella and ran downstairs. Then pulling the basket behind me with my bag over my shoulder and my umbrella tucked under my arm I began my short walk to the Laundromat and possibly something I only ever dreamt of.


End file.
